Penguin Wii Component scam?

I always stick with first party
29.95 on Nintendo's site

Mine "look" gold plated... at any rate, they work with 480p just fine

Yes they are

You sure that's gold on there and not something that is merely gold in color? There are lots of materials that can cause something to look as if it's golden, but actual gold plating can be prohibitively expensive.

At any rate, gold plating isn't going to improve your picture quality.

I see no reason NOT to buy the nintendo brand cables. they are in stock, and mine arrived in 5 days, traveling across the entire country. I know they are going to be very good quality. Never know what youre going to get with $20 cables from a B&M.

Gold plating a connector is cheap, at least in materials cost. The total amount of gold used per connector is trivial. If it lets you charge a nickel more per cable, it's totally worth it. The fact that there is an extra stage in the manufacturing process adds more cost than the materials consumed, so why not just use real gold?

I have the Nintendo cables. They work fine. I wish they cost five bucks like they should, but unfortunately, cables are a profit item.